Listen to Your Heart
by NickeltheRed
Summary: "...Listen to your heart, Fa Mulan. What does your heart say?" Shang doesn't like Mulan always listening to her heart above everything else, but Mushu does.
**I clearly own nothing relating to Disney's version of _Mulan_ or _Mulan II_ , or the 2009 Hau Mulan version, or even the _Ballad of Hau Mulan_.**

 **Plot moods and elements are inspired by my other _Mulan_ works such as the 'Dragon's Soul' and 'Smoking at the Mouth,' as well as the "Twisted Disney Princesses" fan-theme.**

* * *

Grandmother Fa was a superstitious woman and was extraordinarily old, so because of this she acted a bit strange at times; but, she was no less wise.

The Fa clan was cherished her and gladly looked to her for any needed prayers, herbs, blessed candles, and her stories told from the ages before.

There were nights when she'd claim to have a real premonition. She'd wake abruptly in a cold sweat upon her bed mat with the image of glowing pale eyes still swimming in her mind. And on nights such as those, she'd force her brittle bones to carry her out into the halls, carrying a lantern, shouting out for the family, foretelling things that would be happening from afar.

Though on other nights...calm summer nights when the crickets sang in perfect harmony and the tall farm grass swayed gently in the wind, Grandmother Fa sat beside her only grandchild in the tea room, and the two of them spoke of the mystical forces lurking behind the world they knew best.

"Listen, little Mulan," she would begin simply. "Remember beads of jade are worn for beauty, crickets can be caught and kept for added luck, and our Ancestors are forever watching. But it's the Spirit Guardians who are not even from this land to start with and they protect the Ancestors inside the Temples. _That_ is where a family's power truly lies. The greater the Guardians, the greater the honor we have shining over us."

Mulan, who was merely eight at the time and was still very innocent compared to the dangers waiting to pounce outside of their homely walls, just laughed at her in amusement.

"Don't laugh, girl!" Grandmother Fa cautioned her, though rather fondly. It couldn't be helped. She loved Mulan since the day the child was born. She could never stay angry at her for long. "If you ever need a Guardian to call upon...," she continued as her tanned, aged hand lifted to stroke Mulan's long hair. "...then a Guardian may appear. But I assure you, it will not be without a price."

Mulan's smile had faltered then with confusion. "Why?" she asked. "What's the price?"

"I cannot tell you for sure, as I have never fully met one myself while I am awake. But I will tell you what my own grandmother told me long ago...with magic, there's always a consequence, good or bad. There's an entire Balance between these worlds to uphold, and these Spirit Guardian stories teach us that if we see their true nature, we will never be the same again. If you take something from them one day, then you must be prepared to give back to them. It is just."

* * *

"Husband Dearest." Fa Li folded her hands and sighed, eyes lowered in plain civility. "I do wish you wouldn't encourage our daughter so much to learn martial arts...even if it is the most basic of tactics. And with your lungs and your wounded leg, it's not restful for you either. She _needs_ to be working on the loom instead, and memorize her music, and learn _not_ go riding out on that black stallion of yours like a madwoman whenever she wants it! You realize she's due to see the Matchmaker very soon, don't you?"

Fa Zhou reconsiders this and he could not believe his daughter who he'd raised with all the love and all the patience he could ever muster was becoming a woman in her own right. That meant she was set to be someone's wife. Mulan, truly, was already reaching a sensitive age—already _older_ than Li was when they first married all those years ago.

Mulan had no solid plan under her feet. So, perhaps her mother had a valid point. It was time that she did. Mulan had to make some changes soon and could no longer live on her regular excuses. She _did_ stir up a bit of trouble in the village, after all. Elderly men frowned down at her and the other daughters her age sneered at her either in disgust or bewilderment. Mulan had always been a tad _different_...harmless and playful in manner, yes, although still quite different.

 _Outcast,_ the rumors said, but to him, _wistful dreamer_ was a phrase probably more suitable.

Their Mulan spent more days out in the sand and sun, her long dark hair unbound and tangled with leaves and rooster feathers than she remained inside practicing for a role in eventual motherhood. Also, all thanks to Grandmother Fa, Mulan reserved a deep interest in the old sky deities, pretty lotus fairies, and other Celestial maidens who traveled through the air on clouds. Their China was the proud home to both the pious, the holy, and the morally-devoted all alike; but in Mulan's singular case, it wouldn't be a having a life at all if she'd continue living in only her fantasies, letting her thoughts constantly drift away to far-off places where her body and flesh could not follow her. She needed to stay grounded, more knowledgeable. No, she just needed to become more _obedient_.

"Alright, my love," Fa Zhou finally said, nodding sharply. "We'll reshape her into her a decent daughter following in your footsteps. Not mine."

* * *

However, as a few months passed, Mulan became none of those things.

She was eighteen summers old and ran off to battle in the middle of a stormy night.

Grandmother Fa was the first to know something was wrong.

And later that morning when they had found the severed strands of Mulan's dark coal hair scattered across the floor near the wardrobe on display, she openly informed Zhou of the white shining eyes flashing in her dreams, which had caused her to wake so suddenly like that.

According to her, there was a dragon in their midst.

* * *

Mulan eventually returned home as an esteemed survivor of the Hun Invasion and was five summers older than she was before her disappearance.

She approached her overwhelmed father baring gifts from the Imperial Palace. Her mother and grandmother soon saw that she had battles scars on her skin made by blades and arrows, and her womanly fingertips were completely calloused over from weapon training. Mulan even came home with a distant shadow of a second identity she liked to call 'Fa Ping,' _and_ , with a handsome Warring Captain named Li Shang.

He had appeared in their garden, requesting for at least one last talk of acknowledgment with their Fa Mulan.

What they all _didn't_ quite see...was how much wiser Mulan's eyes were then. She knew certain things. She had witnessed the unbelievable, apart from bleeding corpses sprawled across the hills and having the cold mountain snow swallow her whole.

There was Mushu—the rogue dragon who was born to fire instead of water—and he was her most coveted secret after that.

* * *

When Mulan turned five-and-twenty summers old, she was officially destined to wed her heroic and respected Li Shang.

They clashed in their beliefs like night and day, but their mutual trust was still there, and besides that, there could be no Yin without her Yang.

Shang was ever grateful to hold her favor, and of course her parents were delighted by the occasion...though from the Other Side, the Ancestors grew more and more wary. Unlike the rest of the living Fa members, they were fully aware of the unexpected alliance Mulan had formed with the Red Dragon while she was far from their own spiritual reach and utterly helpless going to war.

Surprisingly, Mushu _had_ helped her every step of the way regardless of his rebellious trendies. Mushu was a unique dragon. His actual origins were really unknown to them; he was some sort of half-breed, spawn to other Celestial powers from neighboring countries and cultures. Decades ago, he had appeared to be a very dutiful being, kindly watching over all the creatures in nature that were smaller than himself. But Mushu looked down upon mortals most of the time, and furthermore, he wanted little do to with his task of fostering the Fa Clan.

At the start, the founder and first patriarch of the Fa bloodline had been a reckless man once in his life; he was deeply cautious about being sent into battle when he barely even knew how farm rice by himself. So right before he prepared for travel he went begging to a witch-priestess to summon him a dragon with a power that was beyond his mortal imagination to become his personal Spirit Guardian, and then his child's child's Guardian afterwards as well. With five gold coins paid precisely, the deal was done, but from thereon, the Fa-born hadn't counted on their assigned dragon to act so fickle and careless with their lives out on the field.

They needed to be more careful about what they wished for.

(Fa Deng, Mulan's great-great-uncle had gotten the worst of it. Decapitation—at night—inside his own tent no less while Mushu, unfazed by it, had been coiled sound asleep up in a tree nearby.)

Mushu was a three-toed fiery beast drawn away from his homeland, unwillingly bound to the Fa lineage, serving as a mere guide to and Fa child who feel astray. He was always nonchalant and mocking towards the Fa Ancestors overall, or else, Mushu just kept to himself. It eventually reached the point when his jaded night's sleep made him fall into a longer and deeper slumber which ultimately made his scales harden him in place, like a bronze statue. Little did Mushu know—the current Fa residents once used his stilled form for burning their incense.

It was only when Mulan had the gull to run off to war camp in her father's place, did the Ancestors use their ghostly magic to shake him out his cold, stiff sleep. They had planned on sending a stone-element dragon from the outside gardens as an alternative. They wouldn't burden Mushu with Mulan's care. But, amazingly enough, he didn't wake his cousin-dragon to chase Mulan down. Mushu had _crushed_ him to dust instead and went himself anyhow, chuckling as he did so.

So really, the _thing_ was...Mushu was always a wild card. He was the product of a secretive bargain made by a witch's dark magic, so he played the part well, being the one Spirit Guardian who would act darker than the rest. He was a living embodiment of spontaneous thinking, free, and he wouldn't be tamed. Making deals with dragons like that was almost testing fate. It could bind a mortal in ways that was not always fully understood.

The First Ancestor sighed from the Temple window, observing Mulan and Mushu sitting together contently in the moonlight now that everyone else had gone off to bed. He knew that if Mulan was dipping her toes into that sort of power for as long as she had already, it was honestly beyond theirs to change it. She was chosen by Mushu.

Then again, Mulan adored Mushu as her dearest friend, and Mushu had grown equally attached to her in the end, against all odds. All dragons by nature were extremely protective over their domain, and over those associated with it.

Thus, Mulan's engagement to Li Shang had indeed triggered something in Mushu, whether it was actually deliberate or not. Inside the Prayer Temple, it was no secret that he had disapproved of Li Shang all along.

"She speaks very highly of the newly-made General," they told Mushu later on. Nevertheless, this stopped nothing. Mulan still owed Mushu her life, her loyalty, and _she_ clearly wasn't ready to surrender her friend just yet for the wedding's sake. She came to the Temple every single night, summoning him back to her side. "...You do not trust him at all, Red Dragon?"

"With Mulan's very soul? No I do not." Mushu replied smoothly in return, passing by the floating ghosts without another glance and left the gardens with a huff. "He reminds me much of _you_ , Fa Deng." Cinders trailed behind in his footsteps. "A man who has the deep voice of a warrior, but has a thick river stone for a brain."

* * *

Mulan returned to the Player Temple two days later and told Mushu of a brand new mission that called for her specialties. She and Shang were commissioned to defended and escort three princess sisters from their Imperial Palace to the next, the one settled in Qui Gong.

The journey through the upper mountain rage would take up twenty-one days at best, especially on foot, and that was not even factoring in various weather conditions or lurking assassins waiting to attack. His dragonfire roared to life within his ribcage—it was the same feeling that he received each time Shang had interacted harshly with _Ping_ back at the trainee camp.

"I will go with you," he claimed. "I'll shrink down to a more convenient size again so I can hide in your sack."

Mulan chuckled at this. "But why?"

"Wherever you go, I go." Mushu emphasized, though he didn't think it was necessary. Mulan already understood him quite well. "That is the nature of our companionship. Besides if you fall into danger's path, you'll have me to use discreetly at your expense."

"I'm not worried about a thing! Shang will be right at my side too, no matter what."

"Though know this, Mulan...if he doubts you even once after today, I can see to it that he'll never doubt you again. For you, I will promise that."

His words were straight and true; she could hear it. Mushu was always honest with her now, unlike the first day they'd met when he said that he'd protected many Fa sons wearing armor before her, but never mentioned straightaway that he left all of them to die.

She felt entirely humbled and flattered to have a Guardian like him. "Alright, Mushu. Thank you."

* * *

Not long after they'd come to the far end of the river, Mulan was already crumbling under the weight of second-guessing herself.

Mushu watches with keen dragon eyes, hidden amid the rocks, in the leaves, under the carriage. At every angle, he was witnessing one more failure strike after another.

First, there had only a small tiff between Mulan and the General about duty. Then there had been a fishing accident, wherein Shang's net actually got itself knotted around his own belt and when he pulled upwards to throw it out, he stumbled backwards with a deafening splash. Mulan thought it was endearing, but Shang's face did nothing but pale with embarrassment. The next day, Shang had asked Mulan to tighten the horse saddles for the ride onward, and since she was busy with cooking their leftover carp for breakfast, she had asked him to just do it. Well, ultimately, they both forgot who had asked what first, so the saddles never got tightened, and they both ended up tumbling into the dirt when the straps came loose.

So on and so forth, these poor coincidences kept surfacing until they escalated to downright bitterness.

(Not to mention, meanwhile, three princesses were growing smitten with their backup soldiers no less.)

On the seventh day, the royal carriage had wheeled over a stone in the way on the road, and so it rolled off course, shooting down towards the bluffs with no mercy. The rescue was not that perfect, so needless to say. Everything they'd brought got soaked through or was stolen away from them by the river's running current. Mushu himself, was (regardless of being irked by Shang firstly) exceedingly _far_ from happy when he hit the water beneath. Fire Dragons did not favor water that much, especially not _cold_ water.

Cri-Kee, chirping sadly, shook his springy legs dry upon the riverbank and dove into the weeds after Mushu, already slithering out of plain sight again. They regarded each other with equal skepticism after peaking through the brush, watching all the humans ring out their robes nearby. The soldiers began to complain about wearing sloppy and muddy shoes for the rest of the trip.

This mission was _not_ going so well at all.

It didn't get much better from that point either, because of their dramatic fall off the main trail. Hours later, Shang said they would have to improvise their path to Qui Gong, trekking all the way through bandit territory, only with the slight hope that Qui Gong's walls could grant them safety sooner rather than later.

Apart from that, Shang started to lash out with building frustration and insulted Mulan's ability to read maps. Before long, they had attempted to make up—yet it was poor excuse for a compromise. Mulan simply sighed, strained a smile, and retreated back to the campfire. Shang looked as though he wanted to stop her and say something else, but his own damned hurt pride hindered his tongue from doing so.

* * *

In the privacy of her tent, Mushu lulled in the heat of the lantern she had lit for him as she paced to and fro, frankly shocked by the General's lack of faith in her. "I am not liking what I'm seeing," she said in a tone soft enough so that he would be the only one to hear her outburst. "Why doesn't that man at least _bend_ a rule here and there? It's not as if we will think any less of him!"

Mushu opened his serpentine eyes and raised his small coils to an altered stance. "He doubts you," he commented.

Mulan paused in mid-step, instantly backtracking to feeling ashamed of herself. "He doesn't. I know...I know that he means well. Deep down."

"Just say the word, Mulan, and that man will be on his knees."

She shook her head. "I'm alright, Mushu. We can...I can handle this."

* * *

Cri-Kee scurried along the length of Mushu's mane, peeping away, reminding him that luck comes to those who have a clean conscience.

Mushu knew Mulan better than anyone in this world, that included Li Shang. He knew her darkest fears, her deepest hopes, he'd seen at her most vulnerable, and Mushu would never force her down a path she didn't agree with.

For she was Fa Mulan, and Fa Mulan alone, and she followed her heart. And since he was also immortal, he was fairly tolerant of waiting on the sideline. He'd be there when Shang wouldn't be.

Because Shang was gradually beginning to realize that his rare catch of a bride-to-be would continue to put her own _feelings_ before everything _he_ believes in; such as obligations, tradition, and regulations.

But for Mushu, when it came to Mulan, that was what he loved most about her.

Her heart tells her what to do, she listened the rhythms of her soul. Shang only did what other _humans_ told him to do.

Mushu's magic finally hummed alive once more and he felt a silent _pull_. His bond with Mulan wasn't fading, it was...merely getting _stronger_. More intense, profounder, more _gravitating_.

If...when she came to him, saying so, Mulan _would_ be above all this soon enough.

* * *

"...You're a brilliant warrior, Shang." The night filled with storm clouds and broken hearts mirrored in Mulan's voice as she gripped Shang's shoulder from behind. He finally turned to face her directly, albeit he was reluctant. "You're brave, and you're loyal...but you never trust in your own heart. There are times...when I have to wonder if you even have one."

Disbelief and revulsion struck the General. His own words iced over, slowly and painfully. "This assignment has made this all too clear to me. We are very different people, Mulan."

Mulan frowned in the way only a woman would when being scorned by her own lover. "Maybe we are _too_ different."

"So be it, then." Shang finished, reeling back towards his prized white stallion and he mounted the steed with one last sigh. "Alas we have our mission to complete, soldier. Report back to the campground swiftly."

Thunder rolled in overhead while Mulan lingered where she stood, watching him go. They never had found the right common ground to coexist on yet—which made Mulan fume under the coming rainfall,

festering with a quiet fury. "So be it."

* * *

Mulan did not speak to any of the men all morning.

She left camp alone early with the last of the Emperor's gold in her pocket and returned with an ox to carry the princess sisters the rest of the way in place of their lost carriage.

From there, everyone was at an emotional standstill. The peculiar trio of talkative soldiers were, at last, silent as the grave—it was something Mushu didn't know was possible. The princesses themselves were frowning with bowed heads, swaying upon the ox's shoulders. Shang was glancing at everything but Mulan, and Mulan had that look about her again. Mushu could just sense it. It was the same troubled, quiet look she gave him up in the mountains once before, covered in snow and blood from the avalanche she had caused—with the last cannon they had—lit with his dragonfire.

p"So," he began softly, a faint hint of derision. "It's a beautiful morning we are having, isn't it? Considering how it much rain there was last night."

Currently, Mulan just slowed Khan down to a leisure trot and gazed over at the General with hard, sorrowful eyes. Shang stared back at her, a mild scowl glossing over his features. He broke the connection first, (as he _always_ did since the very day he let Mulan go home with nothing but the stupid little phrase _"You—ah, you fight good—"_ ), and then Mulan tore her eyes from him just as coolly.

Mushu didn't exactly need the power of predicting the future to know that their _beautiful sunlit day_ so far was going end very badly and very drastically right then and there. He knew it as soon as Shang and Mulan continued to ride up through the shadowy mountain gorge ahead of them, both on opposite sides of the jagged rock formations that divided their path into two separate trails. Shang took the left lane with the fellow soldiers, and Mulan ventured to the right side with the princesses closely on her tail.

"...If it comforts you, Mulan," Mushu muttered from his current hiding place. "I will say that I am sorry to see that your...mortal customs have ended up hurting you two."

"No. _My_ eyes have been opened to see how broken my love for him truly was, Mushu."

"In that case I do mean it, Mulan. You have me, forever and always. Just say the word and you can be above him and everything he believes in."

Her following smile was a miserable one, but it was a smile still. "I know. You're always looking out for me Mushu. I promise I'll repay you for that someday."

"—Mulan?"

"Yes, Princess Mei?"

"—Are you alright? Who are you speaking to?"

All Mulan said in that moment was, "I'm alright, Your Highness, thank you." And with that, she caught Mushu dipping back down into her weapon pouch again.

* * *

None of them saw the Mongol ambush coming. That was one thing.

The next thing they all knew, there was a bloody blur, and the cords were being cut, and the wood planks gave way, and the bridge holding up Mulan and Shang had _snapped_ , sending them down in midair, only to be saved by a single strand of rope leftover.

Mulan's muscles strained as she caught Shang's wrist in time, and she peered down into his eyes with more vigilance and more apprehension he had ever seen. "Shang, hold on!" she ordered him.

"The rope won't hold us both!" he struggled to suppress his pain.

"NO!" Mulan bellowed, her mind reeling, her fingers white-tight. Her mouth opened once more, with Mushu's name snaking up to the tip of her tongue, but it failed her. Dragonfire would not help them here. "It will, Shang!" she cried out instead. "Don't you dare _let_ go! Not like this, not again! Don't do it!"

"Mulan...," The General however, was ready and set on his sacrifice, knowing it was only right by her. It was his martial _duty_ to put the lives around him before his. "...I'm sorry. Truly sorry."

Then he suddenly released, and went plummeting down right into the river, scarcely missing the jagged rocks altogether.

Mulan watched, purely overwhelmed.

 _"SHANG!"_

* * *

Night fell. Thunder roared once more in the distance, making the Princesses seek shelter along with their soldier-sweethearts.

Mulan never followed them into the alcove herself. She wept in ire and agony all through the dark hours, alone out in the rain, hunched over her blade that now marked Li Shang's watery grave below.

By morning, when the skies cleared and the horizon blazed red, she was gone.

* * *

Chien Po hung his head low. "Where could she have disappeared to just like that?"

Yao shrugged, gazing up towards the mountains as they walked on and on and on. "Mulan did say before she'd finish the mission no matter what."

"She didn't even say goodbye," Ling pointed out, dejected.

"But," Princess Mei protested, "how can she finish the mission without us?"

"—She'll most likely try and take your place."

Wait.

That voice! That white stallion with Imperial-colored reins! Gasping loudly, the Princesses all stopped in their tracks, their faces lifting with both astonishment and relief.

"General!" They men happened to cry out at once. "You're alive!"

"Mulan was right," Shang added straightaway, not wanting to waste more time by telling them how he managed to survive and wash up on shore. "If you do not want to marry a Prince you don't even know beforehand, you shouldn't have to. So I'm going to Qui Gong, after her."

"We wish to go too," Princess Ting-Ting declared bravely. "We can't let her do this alone."

"No, Your Highness." Shang countered, glancing down at them before giving his steed a forceful kick ahead. "Please stay here where it's safer for you and your sisters!"

* * *

The King of Qui Gong burst off his throne in an uproar, threatening their wanted alliance with the Middle Kingdom. "A marriage was promised! Promised!"

"And a marriage there shall be!" Mulan determined, concealing her heartache well. She felt cold and hollow, half-sure and half-dead, but her feet were planted steadfast upon the scarlet-draped steps just the same. Bowing before the King then, she continued. "...Milord, I would be honored if you'd allow me to wed your firstborn son to make up for what has been lost."

"You?" First, he barked out a laugh. "Surely not." Then, his head advisor who looked too much like Chi Fu for Mulan's comfort had shuffled up to his side, making a stand and whispering to him that she'd be a worthy trade. The Woman Hero of China for three presumably-drowned Princesses...it was acceptable.

"Hm." King Qin wavered, reweighing the options, and he agreed. "This was not prearranged. And it will take another day to alter such wedding plans. However, honor smiles upon you today, Fa Mulan, and you will make a fine enough bride for my eldest son, Crown Prince Gee-Ki."

* * *

"It...looks as though we can't be friends any longer after tonight, Mushu. Our championship must end here after all."

She could hardly let the words out. She could barely stand the thought of marrying that—that— _child_ —an ugly, spoiled brat who was younger than her by six summers at least, but who was certainly old enough to personally engage in marital ceremonies and make her Palace life a living nightmare.

"Mulan." The dragon slunk over to her as she sat before the tall golden mirror. He climbed back under the hem of her regal wedding gown, up her spine, scale on flesh, and purred soothingly. "What is it that you truly want? Tell me."

"I—" Mulan's grieving stony demeanor finally cracked and abruptly she choked on a rattling sob, tears streaming. "—I don't know what to do now, Mushu—or what I want!"

"Of course you do...," he urged her, coaxed her, as if she was a newborn chick trying to hatch her way of out of her shell for the very first time. "...Listen to your heart, Fa Mulan. What else? What does your heart say?"

"I—"

"Say the word, Mulan." Mushu's phrasing was like a lullaby to her ears. It had been quite some time since she'd felt something so comfortable and pleasant surround her, even while Shang had been courting her. "You've known this day would come all along. You just had to be ready for it. You will no longer have to be a single half to someone lost. You can be above those who insist on telling you your feelings are wrong. Just say the word and your debt is repaid...and I'll give you so much more. As a gift, you can be whole again. Let us become one."

Lifting her head, and her gaze steady, Mulan made her choice.

"Yes."

That sealed it. Mushu's eyes went aglow.

An unseen power rose from within his belly, and it started to spark, simmer, and pop under his claws. Mulan hissed briefly between her teeth as it happened. There was a warming sensation, like a hot iron rod being pressed against her neck, down her back, where Mushu's fluid coils were resting, and it gradually sunk nearly past her skin. Then it cooled. The dragon evaporated into a red-tinted steam rising from her own pores. And he claimed her body wholly, trailing along, and ended up spiraling around her chest, her torso, her lower regions, stopping at her upper thigh, settling in.

Mushu's physical form was no longer there. He was now a part from hers. He was magnificently exposed on her flesh like a tattoo, like a birthmark, branding her to a dragon's full delight.

After the reality of their close bond rolled over her delicately, Mulan had realized she actually _loved_ the feeling.

She never felt so empowered before.

Grandmother Fa was right. She would never be the same again.

* * *

The King, his son, and the whole Qui Gong population fell to their knees at the horrific sight of her. They trembled and whispered their prayers, pleading and hopeful.

"The Golden Dragon of Unity has possessed her!"

"No," Mulan said with a mild hiss, her eyes aflame. " _Red_ Dragon."

* * *

When Shang finally rode in through the main gates of the city...there was no wedding to taking place. No Princes to challenge. No Kings to debate with.

The inner Palace of Qui Gong was quiet. Too quiet for it being prepared to celebrate the grand arrival of the Emperor's daughters.

The staff working they're shifts were scuffling around in their slippers back and forth, tidying up the halls. And upon questioning, the lower servants hesitantly held their tongues and merely pointed Shang in the direction of the throne room.

Heart lurching, he used his stallion to bust through the doubled doors and he galloped up the great hall littered with...ash? Piles of white-hot ash and dying embers dirtied the entire floor.

Also, Mulan was there, sitting several feet in front of him. Shang pulled to hard stop, baffled. She was propped up tall and stone-still upon the King's pillowed throne itself, head slightly bowed, her hair framing her eyes. She was...stark naked, smudged with soot from chest to toe.

"...Mulan?" he let out, growing very uncertain of the situation.

Like a whip, her head bobbed, and their eyes meet, her stern gaze impaling his. "Shang?" she inquired. "Is that really you, or are you a spirit?"

He frowned. For whatever reason he just could not fathom, it was all _different_ now between the two of them. She did not rise from her royal-like perch to come running into his arms. He did not feel happiness or love radiating from her. And that caused him to dismount and go striding up towards her, to hold her, touch her, to let her know that he was _real_ and he's going to make things _better_ for them.

But, he skidded to a halt at the top of the stairs and Mulan actually had _snarled_ at him in warning. "Mind your distance, General."

"What happened here, Mulan?" He tried his best to disregard how improper she really was to be sitting out here like this as if she owned the Palace herself, and to be completely _stripped._ Though he couldn't do it for long. He saw the strange marking, a red, deep-rooted tattoo...a red dragon charred into her skin, twisting all around her. He'd _seen_ her bare and venerable in the snow before, after Chi Fu had exposed her true self to the troops. He knew she didn't have that tattoo then. That brand on her was new. "What happened to you?"

"I have what the Emperor wanted. Qui Gong." She explained. "So I took Qui Gong. A marriage between the two Kingdoms was no longer necessary. That's what I told the King and his son before I turned them into ash."

"You killed—you really stole Qui Gong?" Shang's blood ran cold. "That's treason, Mulan. That wasn't the way to confront this."

"According to you."

"Mulan—"

Her fingers curled tighter around the golden edges of the throne. Her nails looked unusually long and pointed now.

"Save your sword. Save your words." She glared at the man she had fallen in love with once upon a mortal time. Her eyes burned a sheer white then, like an omen, a phantom. "I am the Host of the Red Dragon," she professed. "And I am above all of this."


End file.
